Sybille, Markus and Rose |
Sybille Wilfer
In April 2003 my husband and I
adopted Rose. We had been in different orphanages in Zambia
and I was deeply touched with the circumstances in which the
orphans have to live.
About 20 per cent of the Zambian
population is HIV infected or already ill. Aids is not
curable and behind remain older people and children who are
sometimes also infected.
Since last year I support Kasisi
Children’s Home. I help with office and computer work once a
week, try to get some money from friends in Germany or
elsewhere (that’s why I wrote this) and if the little babies
are too impatient during lunchtime I help with great
pleasure giving them their little bottles.
Our daughter used to live more
than one year in Kasisi. She was four months when she
arrived and eighteen months when she went home with us.
First she was in the House of Hope, because she seemed to be
an aids orphan, week and tiny. Everyone thought she would
die, but she did not.
Kasisi is a wonderful place for
me. Not only because I saw my daughter here for the first
time. It is because of the Sisters who work with an
unselfish love and devotion. Every
single child out of the 230 living in Kasisi is deeply
loved. Children here are not stored or kept, they get the
chance to become independent, responsible and emancipated
human beings. Every child goes to school.
The most impressive feeling in
Kasisi is the positive spirit that you can feel as soon as
you enter the orphanage.
Kasisi is one of the largest
orphanages in Zambia. There is the House of Hope, a hospice
for children who suffer from aids or malnutrition and are
staying at or are brought to Kasisi to live their days with
the feeling of safety and peace.
There is the baby wing with
about 30 babies, the number varies, between one day and 5
months old, who are looked after by housemothers. The baby
room used to be very tense. Usually two babies had to share
one little bed and they still do. But thanks to the Dutch
Wild Geese Foundation, Kasisi is now building a new wing. In
a few months there will be more space and a brand new baby
milk kitchen. Of course there is a big need for money to
functionally furnish the place.
In Kasisi are toddler’s rooms
and pupil’s rooms as well. There is also a
house where children who are HIV positive
are looked after. They often suffer with infections and skin
diseases. And there is a house for 25 street kids. Sister
Mariola sometimes mentions they cause more trouble than all
the other children of the children’s home...
There is plenty to tell about
this place 35 km outside of Lusaka. Life stories of children
who are so sad, that I hardly can sleep. I would like to
write about the work of women who give their entirely life
to children in surroundings where a child on his own has no
rights and about the spirit of this incredible strong women
who give children hope and love.
There is no public or national
support. The engagement of the Sisters, private donors and
organisations make the standard of Kasisi possible. A big
vegetable garden and a chicken farm also organised by the
Sisters contributes to a continual supply. But there are
also times that the Sisters somehow desperately have to
organise the staple food for the next week.
There are always plans how to
improve Kasisi. And I’m deeply convinced that every single
cent for Kasisi is the best value one’s money can reach. |
